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[This is my final post following a long RBB discussion. I'm putting it on the several lists where yesterday I posted my initial piece on "militias.] Most of us are aware that the civil liberties situation is always precarious in this country [and obviously in many others. ] "Relativism" has always been in the air -- and this has been especially true in periods of spontaneous and contrived fear and hysteria. "Terror plots" have, at least for the time, replaced the Red Scare and other approaches. Some of these terror plots are certainly bona fide action confabs -- but many more are also individual and intra-group fantasies: bull shooting. That's certainly a prime characteristic of the militia organizations which, obviously, are grounded on the "playing soldier" scenario. The government appears to make less and less effort to separate reality from a mass of chaff. With the "Conspiracy Doctrine", it frequently acts early in the game [this current militia crew may have projected something a month hence], often finding a member of the group who will testify appropriately, and, via plea bargain, secures "guilty pleas" which are then used to "prove" that the conspiracy existed. Civil liberties organizations may sometimes come into "Muslim" situations but virtually never where the militia factor is involved. The mainline media breathlessly report every detail, real or purported. Experts are brought to the stage to provide "background" and lurid conclusions. [The context is vastly different, but remember the initial weeks in the Texas FLDS situation. I had the advantage of having known people of polygamist inclination and practice and I was well aware that the allegations were false. But most people bought the official Texas position hook, line and sinker -- until the higher Texas courts tossed it all out.] http://hunterbear.org/POLYGAMY%20FIRES.htm I know enough about the militia thing to not question the fact that a very small minority of those can be genuinely dangerous. But I think the government -- often for political reasons and personal and individual career reasons as well -- frequently jumps very, very precipitously. From that point on, the deck is stacked and the dominoes fall. Clinton and Bush mangled civil liberties. Obama [with Eric Holder and others] is taking that trail. And many presumed "liberals" and even some radicals either cheer or maintain silence. Those who do not maintain silence and/or others who shy at civil liberties relativism -- well, we have our work cut out on that always critical front. And always remember, those Constitution-undermining fires can easily move into our own back yards. I don't know how many on RBB bothered to read my long page on the Mine-Mill Conspiracy Case -- the concerted effort by the government and the metal mining corporations to destroy a militant and democratic labor organization. If you did read it, you saw the two following paragraphs. If you didn't, look at them now, here: The "conspiracy doctrine" has been widely recognized by Federal and state judges, and countless legal scholars, as downright dangerous to every decent concept of justice. Legendary Judge Learned Hand saw "great oppression" in conspiracy indictments. Here is U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert H Jackson in 1949: The conspiracy law is . . . "elastic, sprawling and pervasive. . .As a practical matter, the accused often is confronted with a hodgepodge of acts and statements by others which he may never have authorized or intended or even known about, but which help to persuade the jury of the existence of the conspiracy itself. In other words, a conspiracy is often proved by evidence that is admissible only upon the assumption that the conspiracy existed." http://hunterbear.org/Mine-Millconspiracycase.htm Hunter Gray [Hunter Bear] HUNTER GRAY [HUNTER BEAR/JOHN R SALTER JR] Mi'kmaq /St. Francis Abenaki/St. Regis Mohawk Protected by Na´shdo´i´ba´i´ and Ohkwari' I have always lived and worked in the Borderlands. Our Hunterbear website is now more than ten years old. It contains a vast amount of social justice material. Check out our Directory/Index: http://hunterbear.org/directory.htm See: The Stormy Adoption of an Indian Child [My Father] and its accompanying essay on Minority Adoptions and Native Land and Resources: http://hunterbear.org/James%20and%20Salter%20and%20Dad.htm For a good feel for some of the civil liberties challenges faced by an effective organizer, see this cluster of four full consecutive related pages: http://hunterbear.org/a_bizarre__1979_fbi_smear_effort.htm This is not just history. This is a contemporary and national matter. ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: [email protected] Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
